 The purpose of writing a good cover letter is to make your application stand out and improve your chance of being invited to interview. Few job applicants write a cover letter or they waste the opportunity with a generic or poor cover letter. In this video, we take you through how to structure a letter, what to include and what not to and we provide examples for each section of your letter. My name is Jess Coles and I've sat in over a thousand interviews and I've seen plenty of covering letters, good and bad. And if you're new to this channel, Enhance.training provides online business courses to help professionals, managers and business owners improve their performance. If you like this video, please give it a thumbs up, subscribe or share it with friends. A good cover letter makes your application stand out. Typically over 80% of applicants do not get past the CV stage. Most candidates don't take the time to write a cover letter. Therefore write a good cover letter and you will get ahead of your competition in the early stages of the recruitment process. Most recruiters and hiring managers do read covering letters, so use this opportunity to sell your skills. Also remember that a poor cover letter can harm your application too. To write a good cover letter, you must do your research on the role and on the company before starting to write. The job advert or what you've been told by the recruiter is a good starting point. Places to look for additional information include the company website, LinkedIn, Google and industry publications. Aim to understand, firstly, what the company does, the products and or services that it provides. Secondly, understand their competitors and their market position. Thirdly, the company culture and for what the key responsibilities and challenges of the role are and what the key problems hiring this role will solve for the employer. And fifth, the key skills, experience and achievements that you have which are going to solve the key employer problems. Use the research to tailor your letter to the specific role and company that you're applying to. This will make it relevant, demonstrate your interest and suitability for the role and company in question. Do not copy and paste sections from a generic covering letter. We've seen this too many times. A poor cover letter hurts your application, it doesn't help it. And also, don't copy sections from your CV word for word. If you do, you're wasting your opportunity to add additional information and make this information more relevant to the employer. Your cover letter should be no longer than one page of A4. There is always a lot you could write, so it's important to choose the key information that will be of interest to the reader. Highlights how you are a solution to the hiring company's problems with what you write. Ideally, your cover letter should have four paragraphs of information. Make sure the font is simple and easy to read. Times New Roman, Calibri or Aero are all good choices. Keep your letter simple in design and use a 12 point font size to ensure the text is large enough to read easily. And don't use large blocks of text as these can be really quite hard to read quickly. Make use of bullet points where appropriate. Address your letter to the person dealing with the application. In most cases, this will be the hiring manager or internal recruiter or an HR person. The job adverts may say who this is. If not, don't be afraid to call and ask for the name of the person you should send your letter to. This gives you another opportunity to show your keenness and professionalism. If you're applying through a recruiter, then ask for the name of the hiring manager and make sure you get the spelling right. If you're not able to find the right person to address the letter to, then use Dear Sir or Madam. Your cover letter should be structured as a formal business letter would be. Include your name and all your contact details, including your phone number, your email and your full postal address at the top of the letter. And make sure your email address is a professional looking one. You know, using something like Wicked900 at gmail.com doesn't really come across very well. Below this section include the contact name, the company name and their postal address. It should look something like this. The opening paragraph should be short, concise and explain why you're applying to the company. Here's an example. In the second paragraph, explain why you are suitable for the job and explain what makes you an applicant they should be interested in speaking to. What you put in this paragraph depends on your research and what the hiring company is looking for. Tick off as many of the key criteria as possible without creating a bland list. Here's an example. Do not copy sections of your CV into the cover letter. In paragraph three, use examples or achievements to highlight what you have delivered and what you can potentially deliver for this company. Here's an example. Use your best examples here to grab the reader's attention and leave them wanting more. Your CV should have more detail, so don't worry about trying to add everything in here. Use this section to highlight the important points of your CV while making sure it is relevant to the job requirements for this specific company. In the fourth paragraph, show or explain why you are interested in this company and remind the reader of your top two or three points as to why you can solve their key problems. And finally, ask to meet the reader or the hiring manager at interview as the last point in your letter. Here's an example. And finally, make sure you sign off the letter using your sincerely, followed by your signature. Make sure you sign the letter by hand rather than using an electronic signature, even if you subsequently scan your letter into PDF format. It is also sensible to have your name printed below your signature. And in summary, make sure, firstly, you do your research before starting to write. Secondly, you tailor your letter to the role and the company. Thirdly, keep your cover letter short, concise and relevant. Fourth, highlights how you can solve the problems the hiring company has. And fifth, proofread everything you've written carefully. And if you visit us at enhance.training, we've got some more examples for you. I've put a link in the comments below. Good luck with your job applications. And if you like this video, please hit the thumbs up button below and subscribe and hit the bell to get notified of our weekly video releases. This really helps us produce more videos to help you. Thanks very much for watching and look forward to seeing you again soon.